pouët.net

Well, some people are still keen it seems...

Why?

Because you'll get sick like a dog under them.
That's at least my personal resolution.

I like the mobile based right now, I have the Oculus Quest. I didn't bought the ones for PC desktop, as I would have to move my desktop PC in the living room (or maybe use a long cable which I don't know about latency). Also cheaper. And there are fewer titles, but I didn't have time to buy and check too many of them, so I don't mind the limited market right now. However, it must have been a long time since I last used it and put it in a box right now. I prefer to game on my desktop PC.

I got a Pico 4, it's pretty cool, much better than my old WMR headset. Will try to do some web based stuff for it whenever I have time. Even oldschool particles should be cute.
It seems to be very open, you can freely install any android APK, including stores. Not super useful, but shows some potential. Just wish there was more software that supported VR headsets, even if it was just as a 3d monitor

I feel the urge to chime in as a VR enthusiast..

VR is actually doing quite well. The interest in it tends to ebb and flow as decades pass but the latest hype train kicked off by Oculus has finally had some lasting results. There's a quite an array of devices you can choose from and their quality has skyrocketed. You actually can get rid of the 'screen door effect' caused by low pixel density without spending more than a grand on your headset. And more devices are on the way, getting cheaper, lighter and better.

The practical issues like HMD units being unwieldy, needing decent amount of space around you, issues with glasses, needing a powerful gaming PC etc. are not THAT critical. I'd be more concerned about the set-up being an absolute nightmare even to someone who can be described as a 'power user'. Many headsets have straight up compatibility issues with some USB chipsets for example. There's been callbacks for faulty hardware. My current daily driver HP Reverb G2 has had its PSU, cable assembly and headphones changed via the warranty program and I still need to occasionally break out the isopropyl alcohol and q-tips to fix oxidisation issues with the headphone connectors.

Then there's the mess with VR APIs. Oculus, SteamVR, WMR.. All of them kinda suck ass. OpenXR is a beacon of hope among them, but it's far from being universally supported.

However that's just fluff. In my eyes, the last hurdle that VR needs to cross is that it is still just a niche product. Half-Life: Alyx is pretty much the only AAA title available that is purpose-built for VR and does things right. Unfortunately, it needs Valve money to make a thing like that, considering how small the VR user base is.

There is hope though; Decent VR sets are getting somewhat common. Gaming enthusiasts have quite often got a relatively modern HMD available to them nowadays - they're just waiting for worthwhile content. PSVR2 exists - showing that there's still drive to make these things available to the mass market. And if you need an enthusiastic audience, the latest advances in VR tech have been absolutely godsend to the racing-/flightsim people. Seeing the prices people are willing to pay for HOTAS controllers and hardware MFCD's etc. kind of makes VR's price of admission a moot point. :)

I guess to sum it up, VR still needs a killer app. A new full-length Half-Life game wasn't it but I think there still is a shot.

Well, porn exists.

I guess to sum it up, it causes everyone to puke.

Also bad hair day!

As for gaming, I would love to try VR with omnidirectional treadmill, otherwise I'm not that interested. You essentially stand or even just sit still, which is ok for slow movement, teleportation jumps, or maybe sitting in a cockpit of the airplane, or slicing the cubes with a lightsaber, but it's far cry from free VR world exploration, tactical FPSs etc... Even if they solve face tracking, accommodation/convergence issues etc... there is this "small" movement thing that makes traditional keyboard+mouse gaming still way more enjoyable.

As for business apps, like VR meetings, I'm not interested at all. I didn't try, but I can imagine it would be quite pointless and more tiring.

So yeah, I'm not saying no, but I'm still waiting for some billions to be burned before I will start to care :P

The idea of true metaverse is right but has to be done right and is not about NFTs or friendly-looking cartoonish avatars. Zuck, Abrash and Carmack are a joke so far. And I kinda suspect why.... cause they surrounded by too many bad actors. Carmack should rather keep Oculus small and operate on a smaller scale.

As someone who has worked on VR content in a professional setting. It’s really hard to get right and not worth the time and investment considering the small install base.

People have been saying this wil change for a decade now, I’m not holding my breath.

tomkh: newsflash: Carmack left Oculus already over a year ago :P

more like, at least 30 years ;)

Maali: isn't he consulting at Meta still? I know he brags more about his AGI efforts these days, but he was there as a funny twitching avatar in "Meta Connect".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdqrFa6pWLA
best Metaverse review so far :D

The "you get sick" argument I think shouldn't be seen as some universal thing, since if we imagine having a near-perfect simulation of whatever happens in a game, it might be that the vast majority of that isn't something that people do normally, like floating around in space, super-humanly zipping along wherever or tripping in non-euclidean spaces (ugh).

There's some uncomfortable rushes one can experience in VR, but some might simply enjoy the illusion of a weird body rush from those visuals, and just getting used to those sensations takes a while. I remember someone back in the day complaining they get dizzy from seeing Doom on a 14" CRT from a good distance away.

VR goggles are always only a compromise. The only outcome that could realistically be the next evolutionary step in technology was depicted in that 80's science fiction show:





The Unreal Engine powered filming sets are the first tiny baby steps into that direction:

Wait a few months... VR hasn't started yet.
I'm not joking.

VR / AR is on the phase smartphone were before the iPhone.
Who had smartphones back then? only geeks.
How we used them? With pens... and a "start menu" lol
Are at that stage with VR / AR
AR is much more inclusive, it does not abstract you from the real world.
I'm predicting things will change very soon in the coming months if Apple releases something, they have the opportunity to have another iPhone moment.
It's up to them to do it right.
It could be a flop or a revolution.
But... Imagine virtual screens around you with eye tracking just look and use you fingers on a table to click and scroll doing small movements, only this use case is enough to do a small revolution, the portable computer could be a thing of the past, just sit and use the AR device.

I highly doubt it will ever get to being as common as a smartphone. I enjoy playing games in VR, and it's cool for some exercise stuff, like virtual boxing or stuff like that. It's great for training for certain sectors, maybe medicine, oil platforms seem to enjoy it... But will never be nearly as common as a phone, even if prices halve.

About goggles related VR I could imagine a contact lens / in-ear headphones driven solution. With them you have a 360 virtual world without anything big and heavy on your head. Only the center of the lens needs to provide a high resolution image, depicting the image in regards to where your eyes look through sensors. The in-ear phones provide the sound in relation to the head position and they have the sensors to define the position of the head. Hand position is scanned by a device worn like a necklace. Sound and image rendering is done by a device you wear on your belt, transmitted wireless (or stationary externally, maybe even far away connected through the internet).

if the price rumours about the Apple headsets are at least marginally correct, then Apple will NOT revolutionize the VR market ;)

If the ideas are the right one for everybody else to rip off, like with the iPhone, they might very well revolutionize AR ;)

we'll see... the parallel doesn't really work as (mostly dumb) mobile phones were already a commodity thus the demand and market was already there. so there are a lot of extra hoops

oh definitely... there's no comparison when it comes to the sheer utility of suddenly getting a high powered general purpose computer in your pocket, obviously the modern smartphone just hit a bullseye when it comes to fulfilling so many different needs in one device - combined with ease of use. If anyone can hit the same bullseye with regards to AR, it's Apple. .. might not be the same scale of utility to people, but then again who knows.

I've had an original Vive for a few years now. I have not used any of the newer headsets, but here's my take:

The good:

• Hits parts of your brain you can't just get to with sitting in front of a screen.
  
• If done right, interactions with things in VR can be very natural, intuitive & satisfying.
  
• You realise how big things are in games.
  
• Isolates you from the grim reality of the outside world.
  

The not so good:

• Needs a decent amount of space to be effective.
  
• Needs that space to be kept clear from kids/pets.
  
• Headsets get uncomfortable with extended use.
  
• You go to punch a dude in Gorn but that dude is actually your wall.
  
• Lower resolution impairs some games.
  
• Visual artifacts can be annoying, although can be designed around (god rays, screen door effect)
  
• Mismatch of visual and inner-ear cues can make you want to vomit.
  
• You look like a total munter (but who cares)
  

My favourite games for VR:

• Half Life: Alyx
  
• Gorn
  
• Beat Saber
  
• Space Pirate Trainer
  
• Elite Dangerous
  

I think part of the reason that VR has been a slower burn rather than an instant explosive success is that many of the best games are more single-concept casual games: Gorn, Beat Saber, SP Trainer are in that category for me. They are immensely fun, but I'm not going to play them all day.

AAA games like Alyx are mindblowing, but they're story-driven, so don't have the casual replay ability of the other simpler games. There's also the economics of it. HL:Alyx has a much smaller target market than previous HalfLife games, but the game assets have to be much higher quality compared to non-VR games. When you can get your face right up to something, you can't have shitty textures destroying the illusion.

I expect VR to keep simmering along, unless something major happens...